44 
Political feasibility 
A State agency (possibly the department of community affairs) 
would establish all development districts with the approval of the 
Governor and perhaps the General Court. This agency would designate 
the boundaries of the development district and elections would be held 
for the board of directors. The district would be established as a semi- 
public corporation which would be independent but manned by a 
board of directors directly responsible to the State government. The 
development district would be dissolved as a managerial unit when the 
new community development was substantially completed. However, 
the new community would remain as a separate fiscal unit in the 
State’s accounts until all of the capital advanced for development was 
repaid. Initially, only one or a few development districts would be 
established in those areas where the potential for new community 
development is greatest. Much development would continue to occur 
outside these development districts in a traditional manner. However, 
after experience was gained through the use of this instrumentality 
the building of new construction might beconcentrated in such 
districts.2” 
This proposal would provide each new community developmen 
district with authority over zoning and subdivision control in the 
development district during the initial planning stages. Since new 
communities will be planned initially in those areas where new growth 
is most likely to occur, resistance should be minimal to this strategy. 
That is, new communities will be planned in areas where the pressures 
created by high growth potential wiil already be felt by the citizens. 
The alternative of suburban sprawl and haphazard growth will be very 
real to them. The development district would include representatives 
of all levels of government. This is an improvement over the regional 
planning and development authority described in Strategy No. 1. 
Resistance to strategy No. 3 would probably be less than that to the 
State development corporation. Development districts would be 
established only as needed and would be controlled in part by members 
of the local cities and towns. Since the development district would not 
have the power to eminent domain it would be less offensive to the 
localities involved. It is likely that political resistance to this proposal 
will come from the undeveloped areas of the Commonwealth, while 
highly urbanized areas would probably support this strategy as a way 
of building more low and middle income housing outside the central 
city. 
Financial feasibility 
Each new community development district would constitute a 
separate fiscal unit: 
The development district can help to achieve four important 
financial objectives. First, it can provide the large amount of capital 
that is needed for public facilities early in the development process 
and for acquisition of land for high density development; and it can 
recover this capital during and after development. Second, it can 
capture for the public treasury the increases in land value that are 
due to public decisions to concentrate intensive development at 
certain locations. Third, it can employ special assessments, taxes and 
user charges to assure that the residents and property owners of a 
37 Bain, op. cit. 
